Identifying with Muggles - The Dursley and 'Terrifying' Abuse

[Steve]

No: HPFGUIDX 158205

---  "Jordan Abel" <random832 at ...> wrote:
>
> On 9/12/06, Steve <bboyminn at ...> wrote:
> > ...edited...
> >
> > First and foremost, the Dusleys have a legal and 
> > social obligation to look after Harry. Yes, is is a
> > legal and social obligation they can legally and 
> > socially refuse,

> Jordan:
> 
> It's not clear where this "legal obligation" comes
> from, particularly if one uses the quite reasonable...
> view that the MoM/wizengamot/etc's "laws", at least in 
> as much as they create any obligation in any muggles, 
> are rather extralegal in character. If you mean they 
> were named as Harry's guardians in any sense other than
> in the imagination of the WW, there's no evidence of 
> that - ...

bboyminn:

Note I never said 'law', I said 'obligation', and I meant
normal muggle social and legal obligation. They are 
Harry's nearest and only living relatives, therefore by
normal muggle convention, both social and legal, they 
have the 'right of first refusal'. In otherwords, they 
are number one on the list of possible guardians whether 
they were formally named guardian or not. 

If fact, we know that Sirius was specifically named 
Harry's guardian. But Sirius being named guardian 
doesn't erase the Dursley's rights and obligations. If
they chose the Dursleys could legally contest Sirius as
the assigned guardian which I'm sure they would have been
tempted to do if they knew there was a huge vault of gold
involved. No matter how you slice it and dice it, whether
in the wizard or muggle world, the Dursley have legal 
rights and obligations that they can chose to accept and
enforce, and equally chose to reject, but the must make
a choice.

As it was, Sirius did the worst possible thing relative
to Harry, he got himself arrested, which took him out of
the running for guardian. That left /only/ the Dursley 
with a social and legal /obligation/ towards Harry.

It seems logical that Dumbledore would have considered
that the Dursley would not take Harry, equally 
reasonably, he must have had a back-up plan. Further, it
makes more sense for Dumbledore to allow the Dursleys a
choice.

I will point out that the 'choice' in the matter
seems important. It is possible the Protective Charm 
would not have worked if he had /forced/ the Dusleys 
into an agreement. I believe that Dumbledore said that
by choosing to take Harry, Petunia sealed Dumbledore's
protective charm.

All the other things you speculated while fair speculations
I don't think are /likely/ interpretations of canon.

Steve/bboyminn